Episode #74: How to Lose Weight and Do It All

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Summary

In today's episode, I'm sharing a fresh perspective for those of you who might find the weight loss journey overwhelming. We often hustle hard in every aspect of our lives – work, family, relationships. But where's the space for our body goals?

A chat with a friend about seeking help inspired this episode. Many of us feel we should do everything ourselves – at work, home, everywhere. But what if there's a different way?

Picture feeling proud and accomplished on your weight loss journey. Let’s dive in.

But before we jump in, let me tell you about something exciting. Save the date – Sunday, September 17th, at 12:00 PM Eastern – for my new webinar: "Do Less Work, Lose More Weight." This webinar will reshape your understanding of weight loss and maintenance. Reserve your spot here.

What You’ll Learn from this Episode:

• Challenge Old Beliefs: Many of us feel guilty seeking support. But is it really necessary to do it all alone?
• CEO of Your Life: Imagine having a team of support to help you reach your goals, just like successful CEOs do.
• Break the Rules: Don't let old beliefs hold you back. Ask yourself, where did these rules come from?
• Webinar Alert: Join my upcoming webinar and learn how to lose weight without overwhelming effort.
• Unstoppable Group: Discover my coaching program for high-achieving moms who want to feel better in their bodies.

Listen to the Full Episode:

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Featured on the Show:

• Learn more about The Unstoppable Group by clicking here.
• Click here to sign up for the Do Less Work, Lose More Weight Webinar

Full Episode Transcript:

Click here to download the full transcript

• Hey, this is Dr. Priyanka Venugopal, and you're listening to The Unstoppable Mom Brain Podcast , Episode 74. How to Lose Weight and Do It All. Hey, my Unstoppable friends. Welcome back to the podcast. Today's episode is short and sweet, where we are going to be planting a new perspective for you to consider if you have found weight loss, the work of weight loss, how much effort it takes to be a little bit too much.

  One of the things that I find with the busy high achiever, I see this happening with my clients, and I absolutely saw this with myself, is we find ourselves hustling a lot. You might find yourself working really hard at work really hard with the kids, really hard in your relationships and partnerships.

  I mean, where is there even room to hit our body goals and our weight loss goals? Seriously. Today's podcast episode is going to do a mini deep dive on this concept of doing it all and how to hit your dream ideal weight in the process. Before I jump into today's podcast episode, I want to make sure that you know about my brand new webinar that is happening in just a few weeks on Sunday, September 17th at 12:00 PM Eastern.

  I am doing the Do Less Work, Lose More Weight webinar. This is going to be a webinar that truly shatters your paradigms and your beliefs around what it takes, not just to lose weight and to hit that magic three-digit number, but to then to sustain it and maintain it forever. You can register for the Do Less Work, Lose More Weight webinar over at theunstoppablemombrain.com/webinar.

  I highly recommend blocking your calendars now because as we know, for the busy working mom, life does happen. So block your calendars now and come live. I think that these webinars can be so much more fun and valuable when you're able to come live, so I highly encourage you to block the timeout now so that you can come and join me for this absolutely amazing class. On the webinar, I'm actually going to be teaching you the three steps that working moms need to lose weight while doing less work. And this is something that I think is so necessary, especially for high achievers, because if you want to keep the weight off, it has to feel simple.

  The way that you lose weight is going to be the way that you maintain it. So I decided to put together this webinar just for you, for the high achiever who knows that she wants to be doing less work, but also wants to hit her body goal this year. Right after the webinar, enrollment for the Unstoppable Group, which is my six month intimate small group coaching program, will be opening for enrollment.

  The other really fun thing is for those of you registered for this webinar, there's going to be a special 48 hour bonus that I'm going to be telling you about in the webinar, so I cannot wait to see you there. Grab your seat over at theunstoppablemombrain.com/webinar . Okay, let's get into today's episode.

  The whole reason that today's conversation, today's podcast episode even came to be was because I was talking with a good friend of mine. She was sharing with me how she felt guilty for having someone come to help her clean her home. She was saying that even though it felt like a huge lifesaver, she has a few kids.

  She's a very busy working mom. She works kind of random hours. She sometimes works on the weekends. She finds that having somebody to help her clean her home has been a huge lifesaver. And at the same time, she finds herself feeling guilty whenever she is in the house at the same time. So what she typically would try to do is if somebody's coming to help her clean her home, she tries to not be there because she feels guilty being at home seemingly, or quote unquote, like doing nothing while this other person is cleaning her home, specifically folding laundry, cleaning up the kitchen, doing all those kinds of things.

  And what was so interesting is she was saying that the reason that she felt guilty is because she hears herself thinking, well, I could do it. Like other people do this, other people are working. Other people have kids. Other people have busy lives, and they seem to have no trouble cleaning their homes, so I should be able to do that too.

  And it's because of that paradigm, the way that she saw how other people are living their lives, how other people are making these decisions, that she's started to feel guilty for asking for support and investing in support to help her life feel easier. Now this conversation made me really curious and I actually came on Instagram.

  If you're not following me on Instagram, you have to come onto Instagram Stories. I'm the @theunstoppablemombrain , basically everywhere on the internet, and I actually shared this poll. If you're seeing me on video, I'm gonna show it to you. This was the poll that I shared and it asked, are you an overachiever who wants to do it all herself?

  Do you resist getting support? And the overwhelming answer, I mean, so many people responded to this Instagram poll. The answer was, first of all, it was a hundred percent said yes. I resist getting support, and there were so many of you that also separately DM'd me, which by the way, I loved so much. So if you ever have a thought like this, absolutely DM'd me on Instagram sharing why you resist getting support.

  The common theme that I saw time and time again with those of you that were responding to this poll was this idea that if you are asking for support, if you're investing in help, if you're having somebody help you in some part of your life, there's a part of your brain that thinks you are doing something wrong, like as though if you were able to do it all, you quote unquote got it right.

  And I'm putting that in air quotes because I mean, I don't know about you, but what does doing it right even mean? Now, the trouble with this belief, the trouble with this paradigm of if I don't do it all, I'm doing it wrong, or I have to do it all to do it right. Either way, it kind of leaves us specifically the working mom who basically has multiple full-time jobs with this constant background hum of pressure.

  It's like we're constantly either feeling the pressure to do more, to do it all, be either at work or at home, or when we do ask for support. When we do invest in help, we feel a little guilty. Now I am here to basically help all of us challenge that paradigm. I don't love playing by those roles. I think it's way more effective and way more liberating to challenge the rules to begin with.

  So the rule that I want to challenge on today's podcast episode is, If you get support, you're doing something wrong. And here's my question for you if you've ever thought that or some flavor of that. My question for you is says who? Where did that rule actually come from? Now I think that this is so incredibly crazy when I reflect on this, and I actually reflected on this a lot after my conversation with that friend of mine that I remember for so many years of my life, I had so many roles and I was someone, uh, that that identified as like the good little girl who never questioned the rules.

  I loved getting rules. I loved following rules, and I remember a part of it for me, and I'm curious if this resonates with any of you listening, is the reason that I loved getting rules and following rules is that was where I got to feel good about myself. I could feel like it was like, getting the proverbial pat on the head from the adult in my life made me feel proud, satisfied, seen, recognized.

  It was the only avenue that I had to really feel good about myself was when someone else, namely an adult figure in my life, was recognizing me for following a rule. But friends, here's what I want us to all challenge. There is no one now to pat us on the head. We've all grown up, and yet somehow we have kept so many of these subconscious paradigms, subconscious beliefs and subconscious rules that we learned when we were really, really little kids.

  There's so many rules that I know that I picked up as a kid, and it wasn't from any one place. It wasn't just from my family of origin or just my parents. It was from all areas of input that I got from school, probably from movies and from books, and absolutely from my family. I learned rules like you shouldn't talk about money.

  You shouldn't spend money on frivolous things. You shouldn't talk about certain topics. You should be friends with everyone you meet. I mean, the list goes on and on and on, on the shoulds and shouldn'ts that made me a good person, and if I just followed those rules, then I got to believe that I'm good and I'm whole and I'm valuable, and I'm like doing really great at life.

  And if I don't follow those rules, then somehow I am bad. I cannot even tell you for how many decades, so many of these subconscious rules were rules that I just never thought to challenge. I just thought that that's just how life was. Honestly. It took coaching for me to identify so many of these rules and to shift my perspective.

  Now, my goal on this podcast episode is not to throw away all of the rules, but I am here to help you challenge them. It's such a valuable question to ask, where did that rule come from? Where did that belief come from? Is it working well for me, or is it maybe actually harming me? A question that I really like to ask myself is, is that role creating more of what I want my life to be like?

  Or is it creating more of a burden? If there's one thing that I know about high achievers and working moms, you want to feel less burdened and you want to actually feel more free, more confident, more in control of this life that you have. It's so amazing. In the Unstoppable Group, which is my six month intimate small group coaching program, we were coaching on the topic of how pressure and how working moms especially feel a lot of pressure, how it affects weight loss.

  It was so fascinating because everyone in the room was having this discussion and the very prevalent thought for so many of us, and I know 'cause this was me too, was I have to do more or I have to do it all to hit my weight loss goal. If you identify as a working mom, I'm guessing you have a similar thought.

  You think you have to do more, you have to do it perfectly to hit your weight loss goal. And what I want to share with you is that when you think that way, you have to do it all. You have to do it perfectly. You're going to feel a lot of pressure in the work of weight loss. If the way that you're losing weight sucks, I promise you, you're going to quit.

  And this was one of the things that we were coaching on in the group was how so many of us have made weight loss, the work of weight loss so hard, it's full of doing too much, full of pressure and hustle and no surprise someday comes along the way that we eventually quit. The best thing, and I love that my clients got to experience this, was what if I just planted a seed?

  What if you didn't have to feel pressured while you lost the weight? What if you didn't just feel good when you hit your weight loss goal, when you made that massive accomplishment when you achieve something. What if you knew how to feel proud and satisfied and fulfilled while you hit your goal? That is exactly what I do with my clients in the Unstoppable Group because here's what happens as the alternative.

  Most of us, most high achievers, especially working moms, think that when they hit their goal, whether it's their weight loss goal, their work life goal, their relationship goal, they think when they hit their goal, that's when they're going to get to feel good. And that kind of feeling good lasts all of maybe a day.

  And what happens before we know it is our brain is onto the next thing. So you hit that goal, you feel proud, satisfied, good for like a minute a day, and then your brain has moved on to the next thing because humans love growth. We want the next challenge, and so the trouble with really keeping your sense of pride, satisfied and fulfillment contingent on the goal is you're in a constant state of hustle.

  You hit the goal, the good feeling lasts the day, and then you're onto the next thing. I want you to imagine what it would be like, and I'm dropping this question here because I find that this is the most effective way to lose weight. What would it be like to imagine creating a lived experience where you felt good about yourself while you lost weight, where you felt satisfied and fulfilled and proud of yourself in how you showed up to the work of weight loss. Here's the thing, I really believe that to create these types of lived experiences for yourself, you have to put yourself in coaching environments to push you to make it happen.

  I know that before coaching, I really thought that so many of my own personal rules and old belief patterns were just the way things were. It really took coaching to help challenge the old rules, and that's what we do inside the Unstoppable Group. So if you're someone who has ever thought I should do it all myself, I shouldn't need support, I shouldn't have to invest in myself, I want you to know that I see you.

  And I also want you to ask yourself. Says who? You are truly the CEO of your life, and I want you to know that you could try to do it all. And trust me, I have tried. But when we do that, when as the CEO of our own life, we try to do it all, we often find ourselves feeling ragged, resentful, rundown, and fatigued.

  And then we wonder at the end of the day, why is it that my weight loss goal keeps waiting? I want you to see the alternative as the CEO of your life, what it would be like to have a team that you build around you to support you in creating the life that you actually want. Really think about like the CEO of the biggest companies and how they create success.

  They don't get a blue ribbon for trying to do it all themselves, like there's no such thing. But what they do actually do is they surround themselves with a team of experts that helps them propel the company forward. That helps the company hit bigger goals that helps the company achieve its personal mission.

  I want you to know that this is available for all of us. But before we can do that, before we can have a team that supports us, invest in ourselves, get support, expand our capacity to have more, we have to first dismantle the obstacle, which is that there's somehow something better or more virtuous in not having support.

  Listen, I wanna tell you that adulting in this way in not having support is lonely in my experience because as I've shared on this podcast over the last year and a half, I have tried every which way I try to lose the weight all by myself. I tried to download that pdf document or the Quick Fix online guide, and it worked for a minute, but it didn't last, and I know that doing it alone and staying on an island by yourself as you try to achieve something new, often creates and recreates the same results again and again. And I wanna tell you why that is. The reason that it is harder to hit bigger goals when you're on an island by yourself is simply because there is no one there to challenge the rules.

  If you have ever believed you are supposed to do it all I'm here to ask you says, who? Let this be your permission slip. Fast forward six months from now, or one year from now, and ask yourself, what lived experience do you want to be having? Where do you want to be on the scale? How do you want to be feeling in your body?

  And from that place, ask yourself, what support would you need right now to get there effectively and efficiently? Here's what I know, and here's what guides me all the time. As I make these decisions and as I challenge my old rules, I ask myself, how does the rule make me feel? If the rule makes me feel tight and constricted and pressured and guilty, I will be the first one to challenge it.

  And if the rule makes me feel more expansive, more open, more spacious, I know to keep it. This is what I do with my clients week after week in the Unstoppable Group is you learn how to do it all, but you learn how to do it all the way that you want. It's been so amazing to see my clients create more of what they want in every area of their life, so they're not just hitting weight loss goals, but they create more in their jobs, in their relationships with their children, and it's all because of this work.

  It's because of coaching and it's really because we are willing to challenge the norm. I want you to know that you get to do it all, but it has to be the way that you want, the way that you define doing it all, and I am here to help you get there. I hope you have an amazing week, my Unstoppable friends.

  I'll see you next time. If you want to know how to Do Less Work and Lose More Weight , you have to join me for my free webinar that is happening in just a few weeks. Sunday, September 17th at 12:00 PM Eastern Block the time. Mark your calendars and grab your seat now, theunstoppablemombrain.com/webinar that you can reserve your spot.

  And don't worry if life happens and you cannot attend live. You will absolutely get the replay when you're registered. I'm going to be teaching you the three steps that every working mom needs to actually do less work and lose more weight. And I think that this is so important because that's the way that you're going to keep it off.

  Whenever I hear someone say it takes so much time to lose weight, it takes so much work, so much effort. My clients' hearing this are probably laughing because I will be the first one to give a mini masterclass on how that is just not true. And actually believing that weight loss takes more time, more effort, or more work is actually going to be the reason that you stall results.

  Weight loss does not need to take you more time, effort, or energy. In fact, not hitting your weight loss goal is going to waste time, energy, and effort. So if you feel done with the constant thinking, ruminating, negotiating, planning, and weight loss thinking, I want you to know that it is possible to hit your body goal this year, but you have to make sure you are registered for this webinar and come live if you can.

  Theunstoppablemombrain.com/webinar and right after the webinar, the Unstoppable Group will be opening for enrollment. This is my six month intimate small group coaching program for high achieving working moms who want to feel better in their bodies and lose weight without a calculator. I cannot wait to see you there and I will see you at the webinar.

  Bye.